Popular Casino Scenes in the Movies

Casinos have played an integral part in the James Bond film legacy, emphasised by the fact that Bond’s very first appearance was in a Casino – the first scene of 1962s Dr No. The scene opens in Le Cercle with Bond playing Baccarat with Sylvia Trench and introducing himself as “Bond, James Bond” for the very first time.

Sean Connery is playing the lead role and for many of us who may have grown up with James Bond as a part of popular culture it may be hard to understand some of the supercool appeal, but if you can imagine having no preconceptions of Bond and viewing the opening scene dispassionately, Bond’s charisma and danger come brooding through the screen.

It’s hard to name a Bond film that hasn’t featured a Casino, right up to the present day when Skyfall included a compelling scene set in an Asian Casino called the Golden Dragon. Daniel Craig seems to one of the modern Bonds that fans tend to agree is a worthy rival to the effortlessly cool Connery. Craig, like Connery is very much an enigma, but Connery is perhaps more dangerous and rogue.

Legendary film director Martin Scorsese also deemed the Casino a worthy film subject with his adaptation of ‘Casino’ starring De Niro, Sharon Stone and Joe Pesci; an enticing cast playing out a cool and subversive plot jewelled with glitz and underworld glamour.

And so it seems that there is an intrinsic ‘cool’ synonymous with the Casino as an establishment, which the film industry has fed off throughout the years. Surprisingly though, the only Casino based film that has won the best film Oscar appears to be ‘The Sting’ featuring Paul Newman. With popular rise in casino sites such as Jackpot City, there is little wonder that the popularity of casinos in films is to on the rise.